Baseball Wins Six Straight, Little III Title, and Earns NCAA Berth

Amherst posted six wins for the week to push its season record to 25-4 towards its second straight NCAA bid as the No. 4 seed in the New England region. Facing Brandeis in its first matchup of the weekend, Amherst is 3-2 against the NCAA field, posting wins over Brandeis and Eastern Connecticut State University though falling to Southern Maine within the New England bracket, and splitting games with Allegheny and St. Thomas in the Mideast and Midwest Regions, respectively.

The Jeffs hold onto the No. 1 spot in New England and move up to No. 7 in the nation according to the ABCA/Collegiate Baseball NCAA Division III Poll. Though the doubleheader at Williams was cancelled, the archrivals both posted 3-1 records in Little III competition to be trivalry co-champs. In the final week of league score-reporting, leftfielder Josh Carroll (Winchester, MA) earned NESCAC Co-Player of the Week honors as he went 9-for-16 with two homeruns as part of his ten runs. The junior continued his hard-hitting streak through the Endicott and AIC thrashings. Carroll has gone over the fence in four of the Jeffs' last five games after tallying three through the first 24 contests of the season.

The Jeffs kicked off the week with a 14-2 romp over North Adams. Greg Berchelmann (St. Louis, MO) had four hits in five at bats while scoring three runs. His sixth homerun of the season drove in three of his six RBI, the third time this year the sophmore has tallied six RBI in a single game. Centerfielder Mike Sullivan (Andover, MA) was a perfect 3-for-3 at the plate with a pair of doubles and a triple. The Mohawks hit into three double plays while the Jeffs racked up 18 hits, including five players with multiple hits.

Travelling to Wesleyan for what would be their last Little III game, Amherst took a 3-1 lead in the 5th before the Cardinals responded with four runs in the bottom of the inning. Ian Downes (Pound Ridge, NY) struck out five of the next six batters as the Jeffs fought back to a 5-5 tie early in the 8th off Carroll's first homer of the week. At the top of the 9th with a 6-5 deficit, Amherst took advantage of an early error and scored six runs off three hits for the victory. This is the third time this season the Jeffs have stepped up in the final inning for the win.

Amherst hosted Middlebury in a pair of games for 8-1 and 13-1 wins. Andy Ditchfield (Lebanon, NH) struck out four in 6.0 innings as his ERA remains a cool 0.90 in 20.0 IP. In game two, Carroll opened up the 2nd inning with a solo homer as he went 5-8 against the Panthers for the day.

Carroll continued to lead the Jeffs in their final two games of the season with 6-for-10 hitting, two runs and nine RBI. Graham Callaghan (Burlington, CT) pitched six shut-out innings against Endicott with six strikeouts. He and four others on the pitching staff combined in a 7-0 blanking of AIC. Amherst turned three double plays on the Yellow Jackets